Engineers are people too

A common perception is that, as professionals, scientists and engineers embody the ideal of pure objectivity. Since Descartes introduced the duality of mind and body in the 17th century, they have been able to study, understand and transform the world as completely detached observers and agents, choosing the best possible solution for the problem at hand, thus leading progress in a ‘natural way’. Reality is evidently more complex: as I argue here, engineers are people too and pure objectivity is a myth.

For example, is there such thing as the best design for a suspension bridge? It is easy to argue that it will depend on material and technical constraints, such as the particularities of the location or the availability of construction materials. Going further, historian Eda Kranakis contrasts the works of two engineers to describe how their differing circumstances and personal goals played a key part in shaping even fine details of their bridges’ designs beyond technical necessities [1]. In the early 19th century, the American James Finley wanted to patent and sell a design that could be built relatively cheaply by craftsmen with limited mathematical skills. As a result some features of his design were chosen with the sole aim to simplify the calculations involved. In contrast, Claude-Louis Navier was an engineer employed by the French state who put a strong emphasis on state-of-the-art, advanced mathematical modelling, which was highly prized in France at the time. “Navier’s bridge was designed, both in its overall conception and in specific features, to demonstrate the applicability to technology of mathematical reasoning” [2 p.18]. Neither design then was purely objective: both were coloured by the mens’ cultural backgrounds and by their hopes for economic benefit or social advancement. These subjective influences might have been conscious, or not so conscious. 

So I return to my question: beyond technical constraints, what motivates our individual and collective technological choices? The answer is multifaceted, but in this post I aim to go beyond any answer that could be construed as rational, for the technological developments we witness at the moment go beyond reason. Indeed, despite all the technological sophistication western men pride themselves on, we are in denial of the fact that we are willfully exploiting and destroying our finite planet, our very life support system. In The Enchantments of Technology [3], Lee Worth Bailey writes

Industrial societies have the advanced intelligence to create nuclear submarines deep in the ocean full of missiles and robotic missions to Mars, three hundred million miles away, but stubbornly refuse to take responsibility for the spreading disasters inherent in industrial pollution. We have the information to solve problems from overfishing to ozone depletion, but we lack the will to act earnestly on that knowledge. Some groups even actively fight to continue damaging the planet.” [3 p.1]

So one can indeed puzzle: where is the rationality in all this? It is to be found in the technical aspects, the mathematics, the scientific principles, the logic used to develop the hardwares and softwares - and I do not deny the importance of reason. However, the same science and the same rational principles could have led to very different technological worlds. As an analogy, there existed on the planet a variety of human cultures that learned to exist in better harmony with their environments than ours before globalisation imposed the Western model as the only route towards what it calls 'progress' (for fascinating surviving examples see e.g. [4]). What I am positing here is that rationality is a tool: it is not the motor of technological evolution. The route we’re on is paved by individual and collective choices tainted with our hopes, desires and fears and there is little chance of tacking onto a better course before this is acknowledged. 

In her essay "On progress, on Airships" [5], C. Dougherty revisits the technological choices between AC vs DC currents, petrol vs electric cars and airplane vs airship. She writes

Such stories help us understand that choice among competing technologies has less to do with the objective efficiency of the victor than with the way it conforms to the values of the culture within which it is embedded.

Bailey investigates deeper than cultural influences by arguing that our choices are driven by 'enchantments', powerful spells that have taken over consciousness. This mythical dimension of technology goes largely unacknowledged, yet common objects such as cars are a most obvious example of technological hubris that illustrates our deep-rooted and barely disguised thirst for speed, control and freedom. So much for objectivity.

One pervasive myth, which denies the validity of attempts at understanding subjective influences, is a utopian faith in technological progress. The faith that humans can accomplish anything; that everything, even death itself, will have its technological fix; that technological failures and widespread pollution are but inevitable collateral damage on the road to progress. I am not denying that humans have and will accomplish many technical wonders, but our power has limitations. I used to work in stellar magnetism, and one of the subjects falling under this topic is ‘space weather’. Since magnetic events on the Sun such as flares and coronal mass ejections can, for example, disrupt power grids or telecommunications on Earth, there is strategic interest in being able to predict their occurrences. Arguing that you are able to achieve this and can indeed model the Sun accurately is a way to attract funding in a society where impact matters more than understanding. Yet the truth is that our ‘unpredictable sun leaves researchers in the dark’ [6], as indeed, space weather is inherently harder to predict than weather here on Earth. Nowadays, I watch progress in fusion research with skepticism for what we are trying to reproduce is no less than what is going on inside the Sun. I may yet be proved wrong but my point is this: fusion tries to answer one of the problems we’ll soon acutely face: a penury of energy. There is also much talk of replacing petrol by renewable, yet the hardware still has to come from somewhere and our needs are growing. The discussion on how to reduce our energy demands is rarely welcome but I contend that there are no technologies that will save us from our greed. We are only handing down the problems, and the pollution, for future generations to deal with. There lies the particular danger of this myth of progress, for it defies objections by arguing that our descendants will develop the technologies that will solve these issues, and so we are lulled into a false sense of security.

Bailey writes

The problem is that the destructive effects of technologies, from weapons to ecological crises, are not simply external side-effects that can be controlled with more technology. They are built-in problems. [3 p.10]

Problems that need addressing without delay. At the end of her essay C. Dougherty reminds us 

We don't need to adapt our culture to our technologies. We don't need to accept the technologies we have today, with the unconscious cultural baggage attached. We can think consciously about the values we prioritise, and the values we wish to prioritise, and adopt technologies that are in line with these values. [5]

Digging deeper, it is urgent to become aware of the myths guiding ‘progress’ so that we can finally make conscious choices, on individual as well as collective levels. A process Bailey calls ‘refining the enchantments’ - for we can’t simply get rid of them as the myth of objectivity presupposes. For this, Bailey argues that we do need to address the concerns of the deep soul, via spirituality or therapy. In France, College students never fail to encounter this quote by Renaissance writer François Rabelais: “Science without conscience is the soul's perdition”. I would go further and contend that technology without spirituality is a dead end for humanity.

Technological evolution will continue. People will carry on having ideas that they will want to test and develop. Yet every technological innovation should be assessed with care. We have to ask ourselves: what do we want our technologies to embody: fear, greed, the illusion of power or control - which has left us with arsenals ready to destroy the Earth many times over - or qualities such as harmony, beauty and compassion? 

One may still take the cynical view that nothing can change because human nature is such that we’re all individualistic and profit-seeking, and that likely outcomes are clearly laid out in movies such as Elysium. Yet this narrative has been challenged and indulging in dystopian scenarios will not help for much of our global problems stem from the fact that Westerners do not know what human nature is. The psychiatrist C.G. Jung wrote

Everything possible has been done from the outside world: science has been refined to an almost unimaginable extent, technical achievement has reached an almost uncanny degree of perfection. But what of man, who is expected to administer all these blessing in a reasonable way? He has simply been taken for granted. No one has stopped to consider that neither morally nor psychologically he is in any way adapted to such changes. [7, p.164]

Jung’s words are even more significant to our times, when the pace of technological innovation - be it in communications, biotechnologies, medical technologies, nanotechnologies, computing or robotics - is increasing and very much encouraged to do so, while in the meantime, ethics committees are non-existent, powerless, or struggling to catch up, and the mainstream population, relegated to the role of consumer society, has no say in the process.

Crucially, we will not heal nor rescue ourselves by running away to space, as some billionaires are already planning, but by making every effort to understand our human nature and what truly drives us. And this is not easy: as Jung acknowledges, “People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own souls” [7 p.168]. But the hope is right there, the hope that by taking full responsibility for the world we have created, by becoming conscious of our biases, by taking steps to understand our deepest drives and refining them, we will understand our power to change, and indeed be able to heal our world for the better.

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[1] Eda Kranakis, "Constructing a bridge", in The Social Shaping of Technlology, 2nd Edition, D.A. MacKenzie and J. Wajcman Eds. Open University Press, 1999, pp.87-105.
[2] The Social Shaping of Technlology, 2nd Edition, D.A. MacKenzie and J. Wajcman Eds. Open University Press, 1999.
[3] Lee Worth Bailey, The enchantments of technology. Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2005. 
[4] D. Templar, Series Producer. Human Planet, 2011 [television broadcast], BBC/ Discovery Channel/ France Television.
[5] Carolyn Dougherty, "On progress, On Airships" Steampunk Magazine, No.5, pp.27-29, 2005.  Accessible: http://www.combustionbooks.org/downloads/spm5-web.pdf
[6] S. Tobias et al., "Unpredictable Sun leaves Researchers in the Dark", Nature 442, p.26 (06 July 2006)
[7] C.G. Jung, The Earth has a Soul, C.G. Jung on Nature, Technology & Modern Life edited by M. Sabini. North Atlantic Books, Berkeley, California, 2016.